Music Training's Cognitive Benefits Could Help "At-Risk" Students

AthanasiusKircher writes In recent years, emphasis on standardized testing and basic skills has forced many schools to cut back on things like arts and extracurricular activities. A study out this week from Northwestern University hints that schools may be hurting "at-risk" kids even more by cutting such programs. Just two years of music lessons were shown to have significant effects on brain activity and language processing which the researchers argue could help close achievement gaps between at-risk students and more affluent students. Aside from better brain response to language observed in the lab, practical effects of the interventions were readily apparent: 'Leaders at Harmony Project approached the researchers after the non-profit observed that their students were performing much better than other public school students in the area. Since 2008, over 90 percent of high school seniors who participated in Harmony Project's free music lessons went on to college, even though the high school dropout rates in the surrounding Los Angeles areas can reach up to 50 percent.' Note that this is only one of several ongoing studies showing significant cognitive benefits for music training among at-risk students; an article last year from The Atlantic gives a more detailed summary of related research.

Comments

Arts in Education

[ShakaUVM]

While (correlation != causation) and all that, there really is a pretty extensive research base showing the benefits of music (and the arts in general) for students.

Education these days has been very, very focused on something called convergent thinking - basically, being able to choose the right answer from a short list. We've bought into the myth that all you need to succeed in STEM fields is convergent thinking, so that's what's taught.

The arts, by contrast, develop divergent thinking. Creativity, and the ability to generate multiple possibilities for the same problem. ("Should I lay out my artwork this way or that way? What if I try improvising a new melody in this part?")

In reality, we need both. Students who are "Masters of STEM" in K-12 often run into trouble when they realize the world isn't full of convenient lists from which we have to pick the right answer.

Think about the job of the guy who has to build a bridge over a river. He isn't handed a list of four bridges, conveniently labelled A through D, and has to pick between them. No, he first needs to generate a variety of possible bridges (divergent thinking) and then sort through them to find which one is most optimal for his constraints (convergent thinking). There's often not a clear "right answer" - one bridge might be 20% more expensive, but 2% less likely to collapse in a major earthquake.

So even if you don't use the arts directly, they can be very useful for cultivating a different mindset from what we're beating into our students these days.

Re:Arts in Education

[Anonymous Coward]

> So even if you don't use the arts directly, they can be very useful for cultivating a different mindset from what we're beating into our students these days.

Very much this.

And then: TEACH MATHS AS AN ART. Just forego this stupid rote learning and teach the beauty in maths. Or in physics. Or in chemistry. Or in some engineering field.

Re:Arts in Education

[dywolf]

bingo exactly.

School and education isn't a vocational program and shouldn't be approached as one.
It's about learning to appreciate knowledge, learning to learn, etc.
If you can give kids that wonder and appreciation, they will carry with them into their adulthood.
Not everyone will appreciate math, or art, but maybe something else will catch their eye. But they'll never know if they arent exposed to it, if their boundaries arent pushed.

The vocations will come on their own for most folks as a side benefit, without reducing education policy into "school gets jobs". For any actual vocational knowledge that much come now to get a job, theres always vocational school. But that doesnt mean all schooling must be vocational in nature.

So many of our nation's problems stem from that very basic dumbing down of how we approach school. People dont like learning, and so they dont do it. They learn just enough to stick with their current job, then watch foozball and drink beer to numb any dissatisfaction at a dronelike existence as they wither away as another infinitely replaceable cog in the machine that makes someone billions he'll never spend.

Known For 50 Years

[JimSadler]

The fact that school bands create much better students has been well understood for many decades. That doesn't mean that our screw ball society has done anything with that information. First music breaks up boredom. Apparently having something to do stops a lot of drug use and other crimes in general. Then a school band relies upon cooperation. Obviously a band will not sound very good with a lot of kids out of tune or playing the wrong note so every band member has a serious incentive to help every other member. Basic behaviors are also taught. Showing up on time with your instrument, your music and your complete uniform are all part of school band programs. And if you look at playing an instrument as a very competitive action things become even more obvious. What other form of performance in which competition takes place also completely avoids violence? Football, soccer and even track events all involve pain and certain forms of violence. For minority groups the individuals become valued for their ability and performance. The white student can highly value and respect the brown black, red or yellow student who stands out for excellence. There is no student that could not help themselves through being in a rigorous band and concert group all the way from 3rd. grade through college. Then we have a world dynamic as well. If Americans are illiterate for math, science and the arts they are even more in worse shape with their knowledge of music. Ask your next door neighbor why Chopin is so highly respected and there is a 99% probability that all you will get is duh. That leads to a life long lock down on the ability to associate with truly educates people. So our dullard students are left with a life of drinking beer and getting into all kinds of negative lives with high mortality rates.

Re:STEM =! Convergent Thinking

[mean pun]

Nobody forces you to listen to only the most recent one-hit wonders. There is now more than 50 years of good-quality recordings of popular music to choose from, and then there are the vast worlds of latin-american music, world music, and classical music. And with services like Spotify they are more accessible than ever.

I admit that seeing good visual art in person is a bit more difficult, especially in some cultural wastelands, but things are no worse than in earlier decades, and there are more good reproductions available online than ever before. Just one good example: https://www.rijksmuseum.nl/en/....

Art has always been like that: 90% of the output is garbage, 9% is pretty good, and perhaps 1% is beyond that. Don't obsess about that 99%, in a few years it will be forgotten. Enjoy the 1%.

Re:Selection Bias

[dywolf]

and maybe the music is what gave them that dedication by giving them something to excite them, a goal to work towards.
my wife is a music teacher. she sees it quite regularly when a kid who was otherwise disinterested in learning, disruptive, etc, finds that passion in music. and once learned, applies it to the rest of his education.

dedication isnt an inherent quality that can be screened for so that only those who pass the test at birth can routed to a college track, and the rest routed to wage slavery. its something that is learned, and the potential exists for any child to discover it in any class, and its one of the msot fundamentally rewarding parts of being a teacher.